A New Zealand news site reports on a survey finding that men resembling the ex-gay profile — “men who were isolated [from other gays] or too scared to come out and identify as gay” — were highly likely to practice unsafe sex.
Subsequent surveys have found the HIV infection rate doubling in the nation’s southern rural communities.
Kerry Price is gay men’s health manager for the New Zealand AIDS Foundation.
Mr Price said the surge in infections in the South Island was fuelled partly by “deeply closeted” men who have sex with men living in isolation from any identifiable gay community, which made it difficult to reach them with support and safe sex education.
It may be advisable for ex-gays and other antigay same-sex-attracted individuals to pay closer attention to the role that closeted sexual attractions, antigay values, and unsafe binges play in the spread of HIV. Unfortunately, the Exodus web site offers no AIDS-prevention information, except to reject condoms even as a fallback measure, and to require “total abstinence” from an ex-gay population prone to unsafe compulsive behavior.
NZAF takes a very different approach, launching an AIDS-awareness campaign in Christchurch and Dunedin featuring a nude male model with “back to basics” condom messages.
The appeal to male libido has me wondering: Where are the statistics comparing the effectiveness of AIDS-prevention posters featuring sexy nude men, and posters portraying disfigured men suffering from HIV- and medication-related side effects?
The most effective AIDS-prevention picture that I’ve seen in recent times was that of a nude, old Larry Kramer sporting a distended belly and other obvious signs of advanced liver disease. That photo killed my sex drive for a week.
(Or was it the Paxil?)
For more information:
Other Exodus International web site references to AIDS (Google search)
Exodus site relies unquestioningly upon fraudulent Cameron data about gay lifespan and promiscuity
Testimony by a woman who witnessed Exodus and an affiliate ministry mishandling someone with AIDS
I think it’s important to note the dual nature of common ex-gay teachings.
Taken at face value, encouraging and teaching folks to talk about their attractions and be truthful and accountable to others about their behaviors distinguishes ex-gays from the folks described in the New Zealand study.
At the same time, generalizing about unstable gays, promoting ex-gay ministry as a fix for sexual compulsivity, and arguing for discrimination against gays feeds assumptions that ex-gays have been unstable and unworthy of basic civil rights in the past.
Their abstinence-based anti-safer-sex messages suggests to me that ex-gay leaders are reluctant to face facts openly. In August I wrote about the same topic in the wake of Michael Johnston’s unsafe sexual encounters becoming public:
What would responsibility and honesty look like? Ex-gay leaders could simply note that STDs are a fact of life. While abstinence and marital fidelity are the standards to which they hold themselves, detours on the path from being gay to ex-gay have occurred. Particularly for folks emerging from patterns of sexual compulsivity or furtive encounters (a distinct issue from seeking orientation change), there is often a gap beween the first decision to give up all same-sex intimacy and achieving it consistently. In that context, all people — ex-gays, gays, married, single — need to know what safer sex is about and take responsibility for protecting themselves and their loved ones even if they find themselves in inopportune circumstances.
Of course, the challenge isn’t limited to ex-gays or single people. A recent study of young gay men in Amsterdam found that more new HIV infections were occuring among those who are partnered than single. HIV infections are also rising among black women whose husbands and boyfriends are active with other men on the down low.
I would like to propose that hiv infected people be placed in sanitorium to prevent the spread of the disease. We could have a movement to test all new zealanders over the age of 18 to undergo a test.. and all those infected with HIV should be put in Sanitorium, for everybodies safety.
thank you for considering my suggestion, seriously.
AIDS (acquired immunodeficiency syndrome) was first reported in the United States in 1981 and has since become a major worldwide epidemic. AIDS is caused by HIV (human immunodeficiency virus). By killing or damaging cells of the body’s immune system, HIV progressively destroys the body’s ability to fight infections and certain cancers. People diagnosed with AIDS may get life-threatening diseases called opportunistic infections, which are caused by microbes such as viruses or bacteria that usually do not make healthy people sick.
More than 900,000 cases of AIDS have been reported in the United States since 1981. As many as 950,000 Americans may be infected with HIV, one-quarter of whom are unaware of their infection. The epidemic is growing most rapidly among minority populations and is a leading killer of African-American males ages 25 to 44. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), AIDS affects nearly seven times more African Americans and three times more Hispanics than whites. In recent years, an increasing number of African-American women and children are being affected by HIV/AIDS. In 2003, two-thirds of U.S. AIDS cases in both women and children were among African-Americans.
AIDS (acquired immunodeficiency syndrome) was first reported in the United States in 1981 and has since become a major worldwide epidemic. AIDS is caused by HIV (human immunodeficiency virus). By killing or damaging cells of the body’s immune system, HIV progressively destroys the body’s ability to fight infections and certain cancers. People diagnosed with AIDS may get life-threatening diseases called opportunistic infections, which are caused by microbes such as viruses or bacteria that usually do not make healthy people sick.